


The First Five Times

by setofissues



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, First Time, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-14
Updated: 2016-03-14
Packaged: 2018-05-26 18:20:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6250432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/setofissues/pseuds/setofissues
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time it's pouring, and they're drunk as shit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The First Five Times

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was inspired by the Stars song 'The First Five Times', and will include five separate chapters detailing the first five instances in which Mulder and Scully kiss. Each chapter will follow the outline of the song and progress through their relationship. Check out the song if you want, it helps you understand the thoughts behind the story a bit better.

"The first time in your backyard,  
Underneath the plastic sheeting.  
Outside it was pouring,  
And we were drunk as shit.”  
\-- Stars // The First Five Times

* * *

 

She could feel the rain pooling inside her shoes, soaking her pristine pantyhose. She groaned quietly, slipping off her waterlogged pumps with her toes. Her tiny legs stretched out and her toes wiggled freely when the shoes clunked on the floor of the vehicle.

“Am I going to need to carry you to your front door, bridal style?” Mulder teased, earning him a deathly side-eye from his partner.

Scully faced away from him when she saw the corners of his mouth creep into that signature mischievous smile.

“Shut up, Mulder,” she grumbled.

“I'm just trying to help,” he chuckled.

The rain had been pounding down onto the streets since the two had arrived at the Bureau that morning. They'd spent the morning in the basement, studying cases Mulder had pulled. They eventually headed out to investigate yet another fake vampire story. That waste of her time, the coffee she’d spilt on her beige pantsuit that morning, and the lousy weather, had left Scully understandably bitter. Mulder wasn't sure how to make her feel any better, but he figured a new coffee and a ride home wouldn't hurt.

The storm was worsening now, thunder cracked and lightning shattered the clouded skies. Puddles splashed high as the car bounced over potholes and the wind nearly shook the vehicle. He could tell Scully was folding in on herself more and more with each violent reaction from mother nature.

The car pulled into a parking spot in front of Scully's apartment. Uncomfortably, she slipped her cold feet back into her pumps.

“Hey,” Mulder said softly, “are you alright?”

Scully's head tilted up at him.

“Why wouldn't I be?”

“You just seem…” he pondered his choice of words for a moment, “jumpy.”

She huffed out something between a laugh and a groan in response. Shaking her head, she opened the car door and stuck one leg out into the pouring rain. At the same time, Mulder pushed open the driver’s side door and leapt out.

“At least let me walk you there,” he shouted over the spattering of the rain, “I have an umbrella.”

Scully sighed, closing the car door. Before she could answer, a truck sped by them, sending grey water shooting up and raining down on Mulder.

She muffled a laugh, “looks like that umbrella isn't going to do much now, is it?”

Mulder, soaking wet and dirty, couldn't help but smile when he looked down at the streaks of grimy water dripping down him.

“I guess you're right, Scully.”

She sighed and crossed her arms.

“Come on, I've got some old clothes of Bill’s inside. You can change and go get your suit dry-cleaned.”

Mulder followed Scully up the walkway, watching her clumsily shuffle up the slippery pavement in heels. He jogged until he was next to her and slipped one arm around her shoulders to steady her.

“Mulder!” She shrieked, shrugging him off her, “you're going to get my coat all dirty!”

“Well,” Mulder chuckled lightly, tracing the coffee stain down one arm, “it won't make much difference.”

Scully rolled her eyes and hurried ahead of him.

Suddenly, she slipped and lost her balance. Before she could hit the ground, Mulder’s arms were around her, pulling her back upright. He kept one around her as the continued up the path, and Scully, begrudgingly, let him.

A loud crack of thunder rumbled through the sky as they approached the door, and Mulder felt her shake and tense under his weight.

“Scully…”

She shook him off her as she turned the key in the lock and opened the door, leaving it open behind her as she walked in. Mulder gingerly shut it behind him, turning the locks, then catching up to her.

“Scully,” he tried again.

“Second room on the right,” she sighed, ignoring him as she shrugged off her coat, “the dressing table in the guest room has some old t-shirts of his, and some sweats I think.”

Mulder gave her a concerned look before following her directions to the guest room. He closed the door behind him and went searching through the drawer. He slipped on an ill-fitting pair of sweatpants and a faded T-shirt advertising a now illegibly named great lake. As he gathered his belongings off the floor, the thunder cracked loudly and all light drained from the room. He heard Scully yelp.

“Scully?” He called, sprinting out of the room. “Scully, what happened?”

He heard her groan softly from the kitchen.

“I'm fine, Mulder. I just hit my hipbone on the counter when the lights went out. Where are you?”

“I'm here,” he answered, outstretching an arm, feeling for her.

Her hand found his, and she gripped it with surprising strength.

“Jesus, Scully.”

“Sorry,” she whispered, now beside him.

He ran the pad of his thumb along the back of her hand, listening to her panicked breathing start to slow. Another shot of lightning lit the house, and for a second, Mulder could see Scully’s wide eyes staring ahead of her. When the thunder followed, her grip on him tightened.

“Scully,” he said, starting to lead them towards the living room so she could sit, “is there something you wanna tell me?”

“No,” she responded, defensively. “Why would you think that?”

He sat her back on the couch and made his way over to the window, opening a crack in the blinds to peer outside.

“You're afraid of it.”

“What?” She said, accusingly. “Why would you even--”

She cut herself off when the thunder rumbled through her house, and the lightning lit up Mulder’s silhouette in front of her. She pulled her legs into her chest as he smirked at her. Scully frowned and rested her head on her knees as Mulder sat beside her.

“You’re afraid of the thunder,” he stated calmly.

“Absolutely not,” Scully responded, sitting up straight and holding her chin upright. “I am an FBI agent, a medical doctor, as well. I’ve cut apart dead bodies, experienced the unexplainable, and almost died. You think I’m afraid of a little rain?”

The thunder came again, this time shaking the floor beneath them with the deafening sound. Scully’s breath hitched and she unconsciously curled in towards Mulder.

“Actually,” one of his arms wrapped around her small body, “I think you are.”

He felt her sigh against his chest. His other arm lifted and began stroking her hair, trying to ease the confession of her childish fear out of her.

“Fine,” her voice shook a little, “but it just feels so illogical. It’s always frightened me, though it really shouldn’t. It’s embarrassing, to be a grown woman and feel so scared of something so… so normal.”

“It’s absolutely fine,” Mulder chuckled, pressing a friendly kiss to her fiery locks.

Her head tilted up at him, her big, wet, blue eyes burning a hole into him. She searched his face for some kind of signal that he thought she was ridiculous-- a child, but all she saw was the empathetic honesty in his expression. She pulled herself off of him slowly, feeling the chill of the air as she left the embrace of his body.

“I can stay here, if you want,” Mulder proposed, nodding at the couch. “You can wake me if anything frightens you too much, or you need some reassurance.”

“Mulder, you don’t need…”

“Trust me, Scully, if you feel like it would help, it’s no problem. It’s going to be one hell of a drive home tonight, anyway, with the power outage on top of this storm.”

She nodded slowly in agreement.

“I…” She started. “I really can’t see anything.”

Mulder realized this was true, the streetlights were off outside the window, and the sole source of light was the minimal reflection of the moon breaking through cracks in the blinds.

“Candles?”

“Oh, yeah,” Scully answered, pulling her body back into her upright fetal position. “There should be a flashlight in that drawer, near the sink. Then you can guide yourself more easily to the linen closet down the hall, the candles are on the top shelf-- along with the matches.”

Feeling his way along the wall and steadying himself, Mulder moved carefully towards the kitchen. He opened the drawer near Scully’s sink, rummaging through the drawer until he gripped the handle of a flashlight. Testing it out, his thumb pushed the power button into place, and a yellowed light shone out, illuminating Scully facing away from him in the next room. The floorboards creaked under him as his bare feet padded down the hall, leading himself to the linen closet on the back wall.

The box of candles was on the top shelf, as Scully had said. He laughed to himself quietly, thinking about Scully hopping up to acquire them herself, had he gone home.

“You’re lucky I stayed,” Mulder shouted back down the hall as he pulled the box down, seeing the matches on top of the wax cylinders.

“Why is that?” Scully called back, soft voice almost echoing down the dark hallway.

“You wouldn’t have been able to reach these on your own,” he responded, setting the box down on her coffee table. “You’d be sitting in the dark all night.”

“Ha-ha, funny.”

Scully leaned forwards, over the coffee table and helped Mulder separate the candles. She lit a few of the best looking ones-- the ones that would last the longest, and set them out around the living room. The thunder cracked again as she sat down, and her knee shot up, rocking the table as she hit it. Mulder luckily hadn’t yet struck the match to light his remaining candle and breathed a sigh of relief as Scully nursed her soon-to-be bruised knee.

“There’s no way I’m falling asleep in this,” she let out a heavy sigh.

Then, she reached out, grabbing the flashlight from the table and flicking it back on. She stood, wincing at the pressure on her tender knee slightly. Her small strides took her to the kitchen, where she shone the light into one of her top cupboards. After fishing around a bit, she pulled out a bottle of merlot and two wine glasses.

“What are you planning, Ms. Scully?” Mulder questioned her as she sat back down next to him, popping the cork and pouring herself a glass.

“You want some?” She asked, placing the stem of the wine glass in his hand and outstretching the arm holding the dark bottle.

Mulder held out his glass in return, an inaudible reply.

“That doesn’t answer my question,” he spoke as Scully tipped the bottle carefully into the cool drinkware in his hand.

“Something to do,” she answered, shrugging her slim shoulder in the candlelight (Mulder noticed she had removed her pantsuit and replaced it with comfy pyjamas while he was in the guest room-- no shoulder pads). “And to help me relax. Most stormy nights like this, especially with a lack of lighting-- go like this. Just without the company, usually.”

“‘Usually’?” Mulder paraphrased, swallowing the alcohol in his mouth.

“You’re not the only boy I fraternize with,” she teased, raising her eyebrows over her glass as she tipped it to her mouth.

“I didn’t mention anything about ‘other boys’.”

“Oh, you didn’t? Then forget I did,” she smirked back at him, watching him laugh and let his head roll back on the couch.

“So what do you do other than drink alone-- or with other boys, on nights like this?”

“I’ve been reading, lately,” she paused to think. “Sometimes I eat ice cream right out of the container.”

“Wow, who knew Dana Scully was such a badass?” Mulder chuckled, and Scully kicked his shin lightly.

Lightning lit up the room again and Scully visibly tensed. Mulder sat up straighter and held his arms open to her, offering her a protective cover. She shifted over to him and leaned in against him, wrapping herself up in his arms. His heart beat steadily in his chest, her ear pressed against it. He nose brushed the fabric of Bill’s old shirt on Mulder’s chest, the material wearing through enough to feel soft on her skin.

“Better?” Mulder whispered into her messy hair.

Scully just buried her face into him again in response, taking in the misty scent of the rain dusting his skin, mixed with the fragrance of her own laundry detergent. A loud crack echoed through her home, and she shook with fright. Mulder’s arms closed tighter around her and she felt herself melt into him. Boy, the alcohol was starting to hit her.

She sat up slightly, just enough so she was upright and could take her drink from the table. Her back curved against Mulder’s toned chest, her head reaching just below his shoulder and resting there. She felt his head tip towards her and rest on it lightly for a second, before he steadied himself to sip the last drop from his glass.  
Scully eyed her own glass and made the decision to sit up and pour herself another. Mulder graciously accepted when she moved the bottle in a way as to ask him if he wanted more as well. She fell back into him, the empty bottle of wine rolling on to the floor from her grasp. The sound of his breathing was calming, the way it shifted her own body in rhythm with his felt as if the sea was rocking her on a breezy day. There was something unknown and frightening about it-- the ocean, and this closeness; but the two were things that felt right in their own ways.

Eyes heavy, Scully felt herself drifting off after her next glass of wine when she was jolted by a shock of light and noise shooting through the room. Mulder, still very much awake, peered down at her.

“While I do empathize with you,” he said, words just a bit slower, signaling his intoxication, “I think it’s about time you conquered this fear of yours.”

“What?” Scully groaned, “I’m drunk, half asleep, and already terrified. Why make it worse?”

“Scully,” Mulder stated, holding her shoulders and her gaze, “we just need to go outside.”

“I don’t want to get all wet again,” she grumbled, pulling her face into a frown.

“There’s that little yard behind the complex,” Mulder said as he stood, reaching out for the shorter one to steady himself. “There’s that part with the, uh, tarp? For the construction? We can stand under that. I need to tell you a story.”

“Stories can be told indoors,” Scully huffed, grabbing Mulder’s arm to both steady him and help herself stand.

Mulder just let her to the front door, where he grabbed a long coat from her front closet and wrapped it around her. He grabbed her keys, slipped them into one of the coat’s pockets, and opened the door ahead of them. Ushering her out as the door shut behind them, he pointed to an exit sign illuminated by the red emergency lights in the building that were borderline murderous looking.

He pushed open the heavy door at the end of the hall and helped Scully step on to the wet grass in her… slippers. They’d forgotten proper shoes. He’d rather his socks got dirty than her house slippers, he was much more tolerant of messes than her. Keeping this in mind, in one swift movement (impressive for his drunken self) his arms slipped under her, and she was being carried.

Surprisingly, no objection came from the redhead’s mouth. She just sighed and buried her head into his chest, clutching on to the material of his shirt. The rain was landing on her scalp, releasing the scent of her shampoo (something sweet, but not floral) mixed with the rain, creating an hypnotizing perfume for Mulder. When he reached the plastic sheeting he’d spoken of, he carefully let Scully down, resting her on a wooden bench beneath the clear plastic. She looked up at the sky through the tarp and watched the raindrops tumble down above her. Mulder sat next to her.

“What was it you wanted to tell me?” She asked, eyes still looking up at the clouds starting to break apart and expose the night sky.

“I remember hearing this story once,” Mulder started, shifting his weight and letting Scully lean into him again. “It’s cheesy, and childish, but it seems suited towards you.”

“So what is it?” Her gaze left the stars momentarily to trace a path up Mulder’s neck, to his jaw, to his cheeks, and finally resting on her eyes.

“You’ll have to excuse my story-telling skills, I’m pretty drunk-- and I think this cute girl might have slipped something into my drink.”

“God, Mulder, shut up,” Scully rolled her eyes.

“Anyway,” he sighed, following the girl in his lap’s eyes back up to the sky, “I’ve heard that parents sometimes tell their children that storms are just the angels having a party. Rain is confetti, thunder is the music, and lightning is the flash of a camera taking pictures.”

“You brought me out here for that?” She asked incredulously.

“I mean…” he started, “it seemed better in my head.”

Scully sat up a bit taller and simply hummed in response. Mulder’s arm wound around her, his hand resting on her upper arm and tracing circles along her coat. She sighed happily at the touch of his hand and reached one of hers over to rest on his other. Their fingers wound together when their skin touched, and Mulder felt a warmth spread through him that had nothing to do with the alcohol coursing through his veins.

A sudden burst of thunder shook the fantasy from them, but not for long. Once the shock had passed, Scully was nestled tighter in Mulder’s embrace. She was facing towards him now, though her eyes still looked longingly at the sky, searching. For UFOs, maybe, but she’d never admit to that.

She sat up a little taller and rested her weight against him, her chin coming to rest on his broad shoulder. Mulder’s arms wrapped around her back and waist; Scully’s hands grasped the front of his shirt. When the wind blew harshly, droplets of rain flying under the tarp and misting them, Mulder pulled his face in towards Scully’s hair, protecting her from the moisture.

After the wind slowed, though, he remained there, nose nuzzling her ear slightly. Scully shifted in closer to him, and he buried his face into her neck, relishing in the warmth and softness of her skin. From this close, he could smell the remains of her perfume, simple at first glance, but exquisite and complicated under the surface-- just like her.

Scully’s head shifted up, and Mulder worried he’d done something wrong. But her eyes were locked on his, her hands remained fisted in the cloth of his shirt.

Unnoticeably at first, they were inching closer together, until Mulder could feel her breaths against his skin. It was warm, like the alcohol, but inviting. Her pouty pink lips, that close to his, her gaze focused on him, her breath on his skin.

Almost as if on cue, they leant in to each other and their lips interlocked, thunder crashing as they did. It felt like background noise. Mulder didn’t feel Scully flinch under his grasp at the sound, just felt her body soften against his in comfort and security as she pulled on his bottom lip.

The kiss wasn’t hard, it wasn’t lustful, or hungry. It was soft, passionate, and comforting. When they finally broke away, Scully rested her forehead on Mulder’s, breathing softly and staring down at him. She giggled to herself when he made eye contact with her, ducking her head. Mulder placed his hands on either of her cheeks, using his thumbs to wipe away raindrops and trace delicate patterns on her ivory skin. He gave her a soft peck on the nose and pulled her into an embrace. His mouth tasted of merlot.

“Mulder?” Scully spoke softly, pleasantly, from her headrest on his shoulder.

“Hmm?” He hummed in response.

“I don’t think I’m afraid of thunder anymore.”


End file.
